Feature and schedule tradeoffs are made. Technical feasibility may be assessed – if certain critical features are not possible the product may be delayed or cancelled altogether.

As mentioned in our previous blog post, many companies rush to begin development without performing adequate planning. This is easy to do.

You Have an Idea That You Think Is Incredibly Good

Everyone is excited and you are now worried about missing the window of opportunity. If you have avoided this rush to failure and have some solid thinking behind your efforts with a great plan in place (business case, market strategy, clear market needs and a basic product description) then you are ready to start working.

Using a great plan (whether an Agile backlog with sprint priorities assigned or a more formal plan) the agreed upon product is then developed. Feature and schedule tradeoffs are made. Technical feasibility may be assessed – if certain critical features are not possible the product may be delayed or cancelled altogether. In either case, the team moves forward with creating a product that will be “above the bar” in terms of what must be delivered to customers in order to succeed and achieve the company’s profitability and/or strategic goals.

During Development There Are Lots of Other Critical Activities Going on

These include agreeing on the plan for testing the product with customers to ensure it is ready for release, planning the launch and lining up the rest of the company so they are prepared.